During community reassembly, consumers may express adaptive feeding behaviour in response to the
presence of other species or according to their development. During the community reassembly after
hypoxia of a temperate estuarine intertidal area, we quantified the microphytobenthos contribution to
the diet of the three numerically dominant macrofauna consumers, using 13C-carbon tracing experiments.
We ... read more then explored the relationships between their size and the microphytobenthos contribution
to their diet. The polychaetes Hediste diversicolor and Pygospio elegans did not show a clear pattern of diet
shift. Conversely, at a late stage of community reassembly, there was a dramatic decrease in the
contribution of benthic microalgae to the diet of the clam Macoma balthica within the juvenile specimens
( 5 mm), which were recolonising the sediment. The contribution of microphytobenthos decreased with
the size (r ¼ 0.81, n ¼ 18) and the largest juveniles incorporated benthic microalgal carbon similarly to
their co-specific adults found in the undisturbed areas. Including both juveniles and adults, the size-diet
relationship of M. balthica followed an inverse logarithmic curve during community reassembly. Such
shape differed from the linear relationship based on the natural abundance of stable carbon isotope as
previously collected in the undisturbed surroundings. Our study provides evidence of diet shift during
community reassembly and suggests that such diet shift might follow both consumer development in
the recolonising areas and other processes related to successional stages. show less

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